Quill pig is another name for a porcupine. Porcupines are unattractive and unpopular, but, as animals go, and unlike eagles, elephants, and donkeys, they are reasonably harmless good neighbors that mind their own business. Here's where we can talk about being good neighbors and why it's eternally important.

Saturday, July 20, 2013

Martin and Zimmermann: The Anarchist Alternative

Even given (what I take to be) the
preponderance of evidence in favor of George Zimmermann’s story, it is not
impossible that he was indeed guilty of murder. Certainly thousands of people
in the US today believe that he was, and they’re hoping the civil suit will
cause him to pay as much as possible for his crime. I should point out that
those who protest the court’s decision the loudest have good reason for distrusting
the system. While it is true that the modern welfare system, including
affirmative action, has been a conscious attempt by the white powers that be to
offer blacks restitution for slavery, Jim Crow, lynching with impunity, and other
injustices, it has been a dismal failure. More blacks are in poverty today than
ever before, the black family has been all but destroyed, the war on drugs
punishes blacks more than whites, and affirmative action is simply an admission
that blacks can compete with whites only in athletics and entertainment.

As Sojourners’ Jim Wallis asks,
“If black youth in America can’t rely on the police, the law, or their own
neighborhood for protection—where can they go?” Let me suggest that the police
and the law—the government, “the very institutions created to protect our own
wellbeing,” in Wallis’ words—is precisely the wrong place to look for justice.
It is voluntary institutions that will prevent incidents like this in the
future and resolve in a just manner those that come up anyway.

The most important thing about the
violence, verbal and otherwise, that has followed the announcement of the
Zimmermann verdict is so obvious that no one seems to notice it—certainly Wallis
doesn’t: those most in need of justice in this country, poor blacks, do not
trust the system.

The rioters are disproportionately poor
and black; the protesting word-slingers tend to be better off, but blacks are
overrepresented there also. After 237 years to work on the system, after
decades of preferential treatment from at least the most visible agents of
government, and even with a “black” president at the top of the pile, blacks still
do not trust the system.[1]
And I don’t blame them: even though I agree with the acquittal, I consider the
system evil.

Let’s back up and assume that Mr.
Zimmermann is indeed guilty. How can any sane person regard the system that
failed to convict him as anything other than a total failure? In a high-profile
case with race at the center, the prosecutor couldn’t be bothered to seat even one
black on the jury. Furthermore, I assume the resources available for the
prosecution would have been essentially endless, and a conviction would have looked
good on her curriculum vitae. And yet a guilty man walked. No wonder Wallis
claims that “12-year-old black boys … asked to sleep in bed with their parents
because they were afraid” after the conviction: the mockingbird is killed once
again.

The first advantage an anarchic
system would have had for Mr. Martin’s loved ones would have been that they (or
their hired agents) would have had final say in who adjudicated the trial. As
it was, they were stuck with a prosecutor who was content to allow an all-white
jury to decide the case and a white judge to preside over it. Given the central
place of race in the matter, this was insane. In private arbitration they could
have chosen their own prosecutor and insisted that at least some members of the
adjudication team be black: both they and Mr. Zimmermann’s side would have been
able to put forth candidates black and otherwise to be “judged not by the color
of their skin but by the content of their character.”

If the two sides had been unable to
agree on the adjudicators, the trial would not have gone forward, but the
innocent party would have had great incentive to have the proceedings public
outsiders could hear and judge the objections to the adjudicators offered by
the other side. Surely the guilty party’s agents would want to avoid charges of
stonewalling, lest their other clients be considered outlaws—“We don’t want
clients of XYZ living in this neighborhood because it’s impossible to deal with
them when they misbehave.”—so any deadlock would likely have been short lived.

The matter might even have been settled
within the guilty party’s agency, with the agency buying off the offended party
without a public hearing ever taking place. Think about it: Are you better off
because you know about the shooting, or would your life be just as good if you
didn’t? Is it possible that you—and the Martins and the Zimmermanns—would be
just as well off if they had settled the matter just between them?

No small benefit of anarchy here
would have been to allow the Martins’ and Zimmermanns’ business to remain
theirs and kept the rest of the world from taking a dog by the ears (Prov.
26:17).

As for the stigma attached to “buying
off” the victim: Who would have been better off if Mr. Zimmermann had gone to
jail? Who would be better off if he is bankrupted by the civil suit? Would the
Martins get their son back? Can any amount of money compensate for the loss of a
son? Would white people who agree with the verdict as it stands be more or less
likely to welcome blacks into their neighborhoods, workplaces, and social
networks? Would blacks who agree with the verdict be more or less likely to
achieve their economic and social goals? I see no benefit to anyone from the
matter having become public.

A second advantage to an anarchic system
is that those accused are treated as innocent until they are convicted. Where under
the current system those accused of crimes are incarcerated (or forced to pay
interest on bail loans) and forced to bear the cost of hiring lawyers while still legally innocent, under an
anarchic system the accused’s agency would be responsible and motivated both to
keep track of him and to make sure that he was treated well so he was could get
on with his life. Mr. Zimmermann would not have had to incur inconvenience and
expense before he was convicted. Furthermore, after the trial the guilty party
and his agents would have had to compensate the innocent party for the expenses
of the proceedings, so they would want the matter cleared up as cheaply as
possible.

As it is, of course, even though Mr.
Zimmermann has been exonerated, he is out the time he spent incarcerated, the
expense of his lawyers, his public reputation, and his safety from vengeful
outsiders. The government, meanwhile, has lost nothing and has nothing to lose from
future such incidents. And again, if Mr. Zimmermann is guilty, the present
system has failed totally yet lost nothing. Either way, it deserves not a penny
more of our money.

By contrast, agents in an anarchic system
would have had every incentive to resolve this situation to the greatest
possible satisfaction of both the Martins and the Zimmermanns. No resolution
could have perfectly satisfied both parties, but an anarchic system could have
done no worse than the present system which, judging by the ubiquity of Yankee
flags wherever one looks, is as good as any government system can be.

[1]I will leave it to others to argue that the
protesters could see a video from God’s point of view that clearly showed Mr.
Martin’s guilt and still want Mr. Zimmermann hanged.

2 comments:

Nice work Henry. I think the major aspect of the present system that failed the 2 of them is its inability to prevent crime. A well functioning system of private security would have kept the neighborhood safe. Without all the crime to worry about there wouldn't have been an encounter between them.